Other Definitions
great britain (dict)
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Great BritainGreat Britain is an island lying off the northwestern coast of Europe, comprising the main territory of the United Kingdom (UK). Great Britain is also used as a political term describing the combination of England, Scotland, and Wales, the three countries, which together comprise the entire island. Great Britain is also widely, but incorrectly, used as a synonym for the political nation properly known as the United Kingdom. This usage, found most often in American English, is technically inaccurate as the United Kingdom includes the province of Northern Ireland in addition to the three countries of Great Britain. This use of Great Britain is thought by some to derive from usage as an abbreviation of the formal full UK title of "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland". In addition, the British themselves occasionally use the abbreviation GB, such as in the Olympic Games where the British team is sometimes informally referred to as 'Team GB'. The UK also uses the international foreign vehicle identification code of GB. This is discussed further under Britain. Geographical definition With an area of 229,850 km² (88,745 sq. mi.) the island of Great Britain is the largest of the British Isles, an archipelago that also includes Ireland and the Isle of Man. It is the largest island in Europe, and eighth largest in the world. It is the third most populous island after Java and Honshu. Great Britain stretches over approximately ten degrees of latitude on its longer, north-south axis. Geographically, the island is marked by low, rolling countryside in the east and south, while hills and mountains predominate in the western and northern regions. Before the end of the last ice age, Great Britain was a peninsula of Europe; the rising sea levels caused by glacial melting at the end of the ice age caused the formation of the English Channel, the body of water which now divides Great Britain from the European mainland. The climate of Great Britain is milder than that of other regions of the Northern Hemisphere at the same latitude, because the warm water of the Gulf Stream pass by the British Isles and exert a moderating influence on the weather. Cool, but not cold, temperatures, clouds more often than sun, and abundant rain are the rule in most years. Political definition Great Britain describes the combination of England, Scotland, and Wales. In this sense it includes distant outlying islands such as the Isles of Scilly, the Hebrides, and the island groups of Orkney and Shetland but does not include the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands. Over the centuries, Great Britain has evolved politically from several independent countries (England, Scotland, and Wales) through two kingdoms with a shared monarch (England and Scotland), a single all-island Kingdom of Great Britain, to the situation following 1801, in which Great Britain together with the island of Ireland constituted the larger United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (UK). The UK became The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the 1920s. Origins and nomenclature The name Britain is very ancient, and came from the Roman Britannia circa 55AD; the earliest known form is believed to date back to about 325 BC Apparently a derivative name from Brigantes formed by the Romans. (See Britain for more on the evolution of the word.) The term Great Britain was first widely used during the reign of King James VI of Scotland, I of England to describe the island, on which co-existed two separate kingdoms ruled over by the same monarch. Though England and Scotland each remained legally in existence as a separate country with its own parliament, collectively they were sometimes referred to as Great Britain. In 1707, an Act of Union joined both parliaments. That Act used two different terms to describe the new all island nation, a 'United Kingdom' and the 'Kingdom of Great Britain'. The former is generally though not universally regarded as a description of the union rather than its name. Most reference books describe the all-island kingdom that existed between 1707 and 1800 as the Kingdom of Great Britain. In 1801, under a new Act of Union, this kingdom merged with the Kingdom of Ireland, over which the monarch of Great Britain had ruled. The new kingdom was unambiguously called the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922, twenty-six of Ireland's thirty-two counties gained independence to form a separate Irish Free State. The remaining truncated kingdom is now known as The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which also now includes a number of Overseas Territories. Sometimes the term 'Great Britain' is incorrectly used when referring to the 'United Kingdom.' Sometimes the island of Great Britain is referred to as 'the mainland' by those on nearby smaller islands. Sometimes the terms Britain and British refer to the whole of the UK, or institutions associated with them, and not just the island of Great Britain. For example, United Kingdom monarchs are often called "British monarchs"; United Kingdom Prime Ministers are often called "British Prime Ministers". Such usage is generally seen as correct. England in a sense of a separate country has not existed politically independent since 1707, although the three constituent countries go into the Commonwealth Games as separate teams, but as one British team in the Olympic games. British is a term often used as an abbreviation for British citizen, a contraction of the full title: Citizen of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Why 'Great' Britain? There are in fact two "Britain"s: the island of Britain in the British Isles, and the land of Britain in France. In French these are known as Grande Bretagne and Bretagne, in English as Great Britain and Brittany. The word "Great" in this context has its old meaning of "large" as in "the sea was great and vast" or "Greater London". Likewise, the ending "-y" on the end of "Brittany" has the meaning "Little", as in "doggy", meaning "small dog", or "Jimmy", meaning "little Jim". In Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae from the middle ages, the British Isles were referred to as Britannia major and Britannia minor. The name Britain come from the Roman Britannia. The term "Bretayne the grete" was used by chroniclers as early as 1338, but it was not used officially until King James I proclaimed himself "King of Great Britain" on 20 October 1604 to avoid the more cumbersome title "King of England and Scotland". Territories associated with Great Britain Other lands of the archipelago Related topics External links
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